An Education
Sony Pictures Classics | Release Date: October 9, 2009 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
85
METASCORE
Universal acclaim based on 34 Critic Reviews
Positive:
32
Mixed:
2
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
The Hollywood ReporterJames Greenberg
Topped by a fine cast, a first-rate script by Nick Hornby and tight direction by Lone Scherfig, the film is a smart, moving but not inaccessible entry in the coming-of-age canon. Read full review
100
SalonAndrew O'Hehir
An Education captures the very limited possibilities for female liberation in early-'60s London -- with massive social change on the distant horizon, but not here yet -- in exquisite detail. Read full review
100
Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern
This tale of an English schoolgirl's hard-won wisdom is thrilling --for the radiance of Carey Mulligan's Jenny, who's wonderfully smart and perilously tender; for the grace of Lone Scherfig's direction, and the brilliance of Nick Hornby's screenplay. Read full review
100
Los Angeles TimesKenneth Turan
This is a performance, and a film, to cherish for this year and always. Read full review
100
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
This happens in 1961, when 16-year-old girls were a great deal less knowing than they are now. Yet the movie isn't shabby or painful, but romantic and wonderfully entertaining. Read full review
100
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Liam Lacey
Hornby is a fine craftsman and his dialogue sparkles, though occasionally the scenes are too calculated. Read full review
100
Portland OregonianShawn Levy
It is, in its quiet, precise, classical way, nearly perfect. Read full review
100
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe Williams
The combination of a literate script, an adroit cast and an economical style is simple addition that achieves an alchemical feat: the best film of the year. Read full review
91
Entertainment WeeklyLisa Schwarzbaum
Afterward, you'll want to listen to the Beatles sing ''She's Leaving Home.'' It might be a girl like Jenny the lads had in mind. Read full review
91
The A.V. ClubNathan Rabin
An Education shares with Hornby’s best work trenchant insight into the way smart, hyper-verbal young people let the music, films, books, and art they love define themselves as they figure out who they are and what they want to be. Read full review
91
Christian Science MonitorPeter Rainer
Bracingly perceptive about the human comedy. Read full review
90
Film ThreatElias Savada
Technical elements are among the best this year. Photography, editing, music, production design, and costumes all add seamless period flavor to the puritanical stew that was London almost a half-century ago. Read full review
89
Austin ChronicleMarjorie Baumgarten
A distinctive story with universal appeal. Read full review
88
Rolling StonePeter Travers
An Education is remarkable for the traps it doesn't fall into. Jenny, for all her naive impulses, isn't a victim. Read full review
88
USA TodayClaudia Puig
Through stellar performances, clever writing and exquisite cinematography, the story is fresh and thoroughly captivating. Read full review
88
New York PostKyle Smith
Despite the lingering aroma of Victorian rot shrouding 1961, An Education is excitingly young. Read full review
88
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
In the end, this is more a character study of Jenny than a tale of tortured love, and a reminder that any education worth having comes with its share of trauma. Read full review
88
Chicago TribuneMichael Phillips
The film version of “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” came out in the year in which An Education is set, and beyond the hairstyles, there’s something of the willful, gleeful Golightly reinvention expert about Jenny. Read full review
88
Philadelphia InquirerCarrie Rickey
Disarming and unexpectedly poignant, An Education contrasts the knowledge learned in school with that learned from life. Read full review
88
Miami HeraldRene Rodriguez
The film wouldn't work at all, though, if Sarsgaard didn't strike the perfect balance between snaky predator and love-struck fool. Read full review
88
New Orleans Times-PicayuneMike Scott
It's a career-making performance that relies as much on charm as on acting ability -- and Mulligan has both. Read full review
80
VarietyTodd McCarthy
Carey Mulligan shines in a captivating performance. Read full review
80
Village VoiceScott Foundas
Something of a deceptively packaged Oscar-season bonbon--a seemingly benign, classily directed year-I-became-a-woman nostalgia trip that conceals a surprisingly tart, morally ambiguous center. Read full review
80
SlateDana Stevens
As she's being put through her Oxford-prep paces, Jenny complains about "ticking off boxes," and at times, this film seems to be doing just that: coming-of-age drama, check. Youthful illusions shattered, check. But as with first love, so with the movies: The right girl makes it all worthwhile. Read full review
80
The New York TimesA.O. Scott
If in hindsight An Education might make you a little queasy, it is hard to resist, like David himself. Read full review
80
New York Daily NewsJoe Neumaier
Watch Mulligan's face as she goes from weary to awakened, and see it all come together. Read full review
75
Boston GlobeTy Burr
Best of all, An Education isn’t alarmist. It knows other people can’t seduce us if we don’t seduce ourselves first and that Jenny is level-headed enough to handle it and learn. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalle
Hornby's humane and humorous screenplay is true to the film's title: In short order, young Jenny finds out important truths about identity, glamour and how adults really think and live. Read full review
75
Washington PostStaff (Not credited)
A beguiling little film that, with deceptive restraint and forthrightness, opens up worlds of roiling, contradictory emotions. Read full review
70
New York Magazine (Vulture)David Edelstein
For all its original touches, though, An Education follows a conventional trajectory. Read full review
70
Chicago ReaderCliff Doerksen
This British drama is handsomely textured and beautifully acted, though the script often feels giddily out of touch with the essential creepiness of the scenario. Read full review
70
The New YorkerDavid Denby
An Education is perceptive and entertaining, but it doesn’t have the jolting vitality of, say, “Notes on a Scandal,” which dramatized an even more unconventional liaison--older woman, fifteen-year-old boy. Read full review
60
EmpireDan Jolin
A decent but unremarkable film with a big, unforgettable central performance. Carey Mulligan passes with First-Class Honours. Read full review
40
Time OutKeith Uhlich
Lone Scherfig directs it all as if it were a breezy lark, so a third-act tonal shift makes for an incongruous, excessively moralistic fit with everything that’s preceded. Most insulting, though, is the way in which the climactic passages miraculously tidy up every frayed edge of Jenny’s life. Read full review
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